Jimmy Walker Wins PGA Championship For First Major Title

Texan Jimmy Walker seemed unequivocally calm on Sunday afternoon as he cruised through his fourth straight day atop the leaderboard at the P.G.A. Championship in Springfield, New Jersey.

Jimmy Walker Wins PGA Championship For First Major Title

He had missed the cut in his last two majors and never finished higher than tied for seventh at any major. In Sunday’s final round, Walker was being chased by golf heavyweights like Swede Henrik Stenson and World No. 1 Jason Day, who was also the defending P.G.A. champion.

However, the 37-year-old delivered two shots that gave him breathing room on the back nine. One last par at the end got his name etched onto the Wanamaker Trophy and into history.

Walker’s first bolt came when he sunk a bunker shot for birdie from 15 yards on the 10th, and the second when he knocked in a 30-footer for birdie on the 11th. This gave him a two-shot advantage at 12-under, and a huge birdie from eight feet on the 17th made it 3 with one hole to play.

But with Day playing in the group ahead, Walker watched his nearest opponent sink an eagle from 13 feet on the par-5 final hole. Walker, now forced to make a par for the win, left his second shot short and right in heavy, wet rough.

Walker didn’t give up, however. With Day looking on, Walker chipped to 34 feet and two-putted from there, the last stroke from three feet, to close out a bogey-free, 3-under-par 67 to finish at 14 under and topple Day by one shot to win his first major championship.

“Sometimes things just don’t come easy,” said Walker, 37, who along with others was forced to play 36 holes because of a weather delay Saturday. “Sometimes pars are hard but we got that one. There’s a lot of emotion going on out there, I’m not going to lie to you. It was a battle all day long. There was nothing easy about the day, really about the week, for that matter, especially coming down the last hole.”

Walker is the first to go wire-to-wire to capture the PGA since Phil Mickelson did so at Baltusrol Golf Club in 2005. The Boerne, Texas native, who shot 65-66-68-67, is the fifth consecutive first-time winner in a major.

“I felt confident,” said Walker. “I felt confident in myself. I felt confident in what I was doing. Felt confident in my golf swing, my putting, my chipping. Kind of tried to wrap myself around that; that everything was feeling good, and to go with that and trust what I was doing. Trust all the stuff that I have been working on, and that’s what I tried to apply out there.”

Joining Walker as first-time major winners this year were the Masters champion Danny Willett; Dustin Johnson, who won the US Open; and Stenson, the British Open champ.

Daniel Summerhays finished third Sunday at 10 under. Three golfers ended up tied for fourth at nine under: Branden Grace, Hideki Matsuyama and Brooks Koepka. 

“I was trying to make a run at Jimmy all day,” said Day, who finished at 13 under after also shooting a final-round 67. “I just couldn’t do it until the very end.”

Walker had struggled to reach the highest ranks of golf. Though he began playing on the PGA Tour in 2005, he was often sent back to the equivalent of the minor leagues and was forced to re-qualify for the tour three times.

Walker, who played at Baylor, competed in 187 tour events before capturing his first victory at the end of 2013. He won two of the subsequent seven events. On this year’s Tour, his highest finish has been a tie for fourth.

He was at 11 under after the first three rounds and began his final round with nine consecutive pars. Each hole seemed to have a sameness to it. His approaches left him manageable distances for birdie opportunities. But the missed birdie putts might have been starting to grate on him.

Playing on Sunday began at 7 am; tournament officials had made the unusual decision to continue the rain-shortened third round on Sunday morning and begin the fourth at almost the same time. The wet conditions led P.G.A. officials to decide to play the tournament’s final 18 holes under the preferred-lies rule, also known as “lift, clean and place.”

It was feared by some players that the rule would lead to unusually low scores, perhaps even a score of 62, which would have been a record for a major championship. But the scoring, while low, was not uncustomary for the event.

“For me, I feel like it was a matter of time,” Walker said. “It was a long time coming, and this was a long day. But I’ll take it. It all ended well.”

SPRINGFIELD, NJ – JULY 31: Jimmy Walker of the United States plays his shot from the third tee during the final round of the 2016 PGA Championship at Baltusrol Golf Club on July 31, 2016 in Springfield, New Jersey. (Photo by Andy Lyons/Getty Images)